The document discusses how WordPress sites can be made SEO-friendly through the use of plugins and best practices for designers, developers, project managers, and content strategists. It provides checklists of considerations for each role and compares popular SEO plugins All in One SEO and Yoast SEO. It also addresses questions around themes, site launches, and single page designs, emphasizing that SEO-friendly means user-friendly through principles like fast load times, clean code, and accessible content structures.

1. @WebspecDesign
WordPress Loves Google
Marrying gorgeous website designs with SEO-
friendly structure.
Lindsey LaMair
June 27, 2016

2. @WebspecDesign
Hi, I’m Lindsey.
Lindsey LaMair
Digital Marketing
Director
@ Webspec Design

3. How SEO-Friendly is
WordPress?
That depends on how SEO-friendly you make it!

4. @WebspecDesign
WordPress SEO Starter Pack
● All In One SEO (or Yoast SEO, but I will get to that in a minute)
● Google Analytics
● Redirection
● Google XML Sitemaps
What
capabilities
does it need
help with?
Install well
maintained
plugins to
compliment
Choose your
main SEO
powerhouse
plugin

5. @WebspecDesign
All in One SEO vs. Yoast SEO
All in One SEO
● Made it into the repo in 2007
● 26 million downloads
● Settings are all in one place
● No content analysis tool
● Modular approach to features
● More social media settings
● Wide range of customizations and
specialist settings
● Very powerful Pro version - $79
No content analysis tool, but great for SEO
experts who are ready to dig in on their own.
Yoast SEO
● Made it into the repo in 2010
● 25 million downloads
● Page by page content analysis tools
● Bulk editor
● Built in sitemap editor
● User-friendly set up
● Paid version adds redirect functionality
and multiple focus keywords feature
● Multiple paid extension options
Great for beginners who are looking for a little
more guidance.

6. @WebspecDesign
“SEO is not my job.”
https://www.pinterest.com/iamcayester/seo-memes/

7. @WebspecDesign
“I never do anything for SEO
except designate page
headings.”
What is the point of
designing a really nice
new website if no one
can find it?SEO is not just for SEO’s or
your marketing team.

8. @WebspecDesign
Do I really need to care about SEO?
Not every site is going to need SEO.
It all depends on how their users primarily
find their site or if they want to increase
traffic.
Do they want to increase traffic or improve
sales? If they haven’t historically cared
about SEO, then the answer is yes.
https://memegenerator.net/instance/55768282

9. Things SEO’s Care About

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1. Content
a. Homepage content
b. Readable content
c. Heading structure
d. Unique URLs

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2. Accessibility
a. Navigation & link structure
b. Crawl health
c. Sitemap structure

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3. Usability
a. Site speed
b. Optimized media
c. Mobile-friendly design

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4. Audience
a. Demographics
b. Analytics
c. User Personas

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(None of this says your site has
to be ugly or a pain in the
@$$ to be SEO-friendly.)

15. @WebspecDesign
How does this apply
to me?
SEO best practices can be carried
out throughout the entire project
or ongoing relationship.
● Designers
● Developers
● Project Managers
● Content Strategists
● Marketers

16. @WebspecDesign
SEO for Designers
Ask yourself…
Is the call to action clear?
Was the site designed with a clear goal in mind?
Is there room for content?
Are there a lot of media elements throughout the design?
What’s above the fold?
Are the responsive versions user-friendly?

17. @WebspecDesign
SEO-friendly designs don’t have to be ugly
SEO-friendly really means user friendly.
SEO-friendly designs do not need to include:
● Keyword stuffed areas in the footer
● Boatloads of content
● Zero photos
● Overly long layouts
● Solid content blocks

18. @WebspecDesign
Do this, not that
Images with text over them? Make sure the font is readable by users and
search engines.
Content that appears as you scroll or hidden content elements? Make
sure the most important content is visible upon loading.
Multiple headers on a page? Ensure there is only one H1 and designate the
tag for the rest.
Infinite scrolling design?* Consider if the page is too long to be fully crawled
or if it needs to be on separate pages.

19. @WebspecDesign
A Designer’s SEO Checklist
❏ Don’t get too fancy for the bots to crawl the site. If they get confused they will just stop
crawling. Keep in mind that Google is not as advanced as you are.
❏ Don’t sacrifice user experience for a pretty site or trendy design feature that people won’t know
how to navigate. Normal users aren’t as advanced as you either.
❏ Consider how large media elements will affect a page’s load time; optimize accordingly.
❏ Try new things and think outside the box when it fits into the target audience’s behavior and
interactions.
❏ Focus as much on responsive elements and functionality as you do on the desktop design.
❏ Make sure you only have one H1 tag on a page.

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*Single Page Scroll...
These are trendy but not your most SEO-friendly option, UNLESS programmed
correctly.
Why is this, you ask?
● Google reads them as one page.
● You only get one URL in your sitemap.
● You have no custom meta data.
● Limited SEO real estate.

21. @WebspecDesign
SEO for Developers
Ask yourself…
Is the site fast?
Is the site crawlable? Can the top search engines find the site?
Did we move/launch the site correctly?
Are all redirects in place?
Is the sitemap changing? Does it need to stay the same?

22. @WebspecDesign
Devs help with SEO more than they think
Creating search engine friendly URL structures.
Programming a site with clean code, optimized media elements, and fast load times.
Making sure redirects are in place and working correctly.
Creating a content structure that follows the intended sitemap. Whatever can be content, should be
content.
Making sure paginated archives are crawlable by search engines.
Minifying code and utilizing compression and caching wherever possible.
Checking for canonical URLs and duplicate content.

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A Developer’s SEO Checklist
❏ Testing load time and site speed
❏ Browser testing - especially focus on browsers where most of their organic traffic comes from
❏ URL structures - is the site moving to a new domain?
❏ Make sure the new site is as crawlable, if not more, than the old one
❏ ROBOTS.TXT files - Make sure they are not blocked from index when you launch
❏ Consider text to code ratio

24. @WebspecDesign
Text to HTML Ratio: Where SEO & Designs Meet
The amount of text on a web page vs the code on that page.
Ideal Text to HTML Ratio? Between 25% and 70% (the visible text ratio as opposed to non-visible
information).
How does it affect SEO? It’s not a direct ranking factor, but it intertwines with several design,
development, and ranking factors.
It improves user experience, page load time, and indexing of your pages.

25. @WebspecDesign
How to improve Text to HTML Ratios
● Remove any unnecessary code
● Remove large white spaces within text or designs
● Avoid too many tabs
● Remove comments in the code when possible
● Use CSS to style
● Optimize and resize images and videos
● Keep page size under 300kb
● Remove hidden text that is not visible by users
● Always include some amount of plain, readable text in your designs
● Avoid tables and flash :)

26. @WebspecDesign
SEO for Project Managers
Ask yourself…
Where is this site coming from?
What is the end goal? Does this site accomplish this goal?
Who are the target users?
What kind of traffic needs to be monitored?

27. @WebspecDesign
A PM’s SEO Checklist
❏ Integrate necessary tracking codes
❏ Ensure initial SEO has happened
❏ Encourage site indexing in your robots.txt file
❏ Do you need 301 redirects?
❏ Are you going secure?
❏ Is the necessary content or call to action logical and easy to find?
❏ Where is the site/email hosted?
❏ Do they have subdomains you need to worry about?
❏ Does the site look more than just functional on all devices and browsers?
❏ Is the URL changing?

28. @WebspecDesign
SEO for Content Strategists
1. Create a clear content and heading structure.
2. Make sure every page has content (wherever possible).
3. Even landing pages should be optimized.
4. Maximize your SEO real estate.

29. @WebspecDesign
Themes & SEO
Are WordPress themes SEO friendly out of the box?
They should be fine, but keep in mind:
1. The fancier the page template, the more dense the code.
2. The more images you add, the slower the site is.
3. Adding more plugins might help functionality, but it won’t always help
SEO.

30. You’re launching a
new site. Now
what?

31. @WebspecDesign
Steps to successfully move a site without issues and without
tanking your SEO
1. Establish any URL structural changes that need to happen.
2. Map out redirects.
3. Transfer existing page optimization if the site ranks well.
4. Establish www vs. non and http vs https.
5. Make sure your robots.txt file is not blocking robots.
6. Make sure Google Analytics, Search Console, and other tracking codes get
transferred.
7. Changing URLs? Submit a change of address form in Search Console.

32. @WebspecDesign
Takeaways

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SEO-friendly really just
means user-friendly.

34. @WebspecDesign
Fast, crawlable,
accessible sites will
always win.

35. @WebspecDesign
Launching a new site
can really mess up
your SEO.

36. @WebspecDesign
Everyone is actually an
SEO Strategist.

37. @WebspecDesign
Questions?